Duluth 5th in the USCHO poll is absurd. They lose basically their entire offense.

Here's some back of the envelope math on returning scoring. I didn't take into account transfers. This factors in Olympians and graduated seniors.

My thoughts:

-Hockey East looks like it's going to be a bit deeper this year.
-Gophers and Badgers lose more than I thought they did.
-Parity is going to be insane this year.
-How is Providence returning so much scoring? They lose something like 4 D, so they might give up close to a billion goals after allowing so many last year.

Re: USCHO Poster's Poll: '17-'18

I have no idea what is happening out east, before any games have been played, so these predictions should not be used for wagering purposes.

1) Clarkson U: Return lots of scoring, but question mark in goal.
2) UM: I like the freshmen
3) UW: Last time they didn't have an All-American goaltender, the Gophers could beat the Badgers in football
4) BC: I automatically pick BC as the best team out east
5) Colgate: everybody's back
6) Robt Morris: almost everybody's back
7) Northeastern: lots of people are back
8) St Lawrence: some people are back
9) Quinnipiac: always looks good in polls
10) Clarkson College Fighting Nurses: nobody gave them a chance last year, and look what happened.

Re: USCHO Poster's Poll: '17-'18

Originally Posted by TonyTheTiger20

Errr you lost me here haha

The original NYT story about the championship game attributed the win to Clarkson College, an Omaha nursing school. Thus began the legend of the 'Fighting Nurses', the 'Monsters of Mercy', the 'Frozen Nightingales.'

Re: USCHO Poster's Poll: '17-'18

Originally Posted by Leather helmet

The original NYT story about the championship game attributed the win to Clarkson College, an Omaha nursing school. Thus began the legend of the 'Fighting Nurses', the 'Monsters of Mercy', the 'Frozen Nightingales.'

The original NYT story about the championship game attributed the win to Clarkson College, an Omaha nursing school. Thus began the legend of the 'Fighting Nurses', the 'Monsters of Mercy', the 'Frozen Nightingales.'

It was the LA Times and how can you forget USCHO having Cornell winning the championship in the original lede??

Re: USCHO Poster's Poll: '17-'18

Until I see the second coming of Cayley Mercer and Genevieve Bannon from two of the returnees or freshmen

1) Wisconsin
2) Minnesota
3) Clarkson Early season Clarkson/Northeastern and Clarkson/Bemidji series will be a good indicator of this team's strengths/weaknesses
4) Boston College
5) Colgate
6) Northeastern
7) St. Lawrence
8) UMD
9) Cornell
10) Robert Morris

Fan of CLARKSON: 2014, 2017 & 2018 NC$$ WOMEN'S DIV 1 HOCKEY NATIONAL CHAMPIONS WHOOOOOOOOO WHOOOOOOOOO
If Union Can Do It So Can CCT (One of These Years)

Re: USCHO Poster's Poll: '17-'18

1. Clarkson - Roses are red, violets are blue, with Tiley in net what's gonna get through?
2. Wisconsin - Roses are red, violets are blue, their four lines will stick to you like glue.
3. BC - Roses are red, violets are blue, Burt and Barnes, seems like their overdue.
4. Minnesota - Roses are red, violets are blue, Zoom Boom's aim will be true.
5. Colgate - Roses are red, violets are blue, That much return scoring will have others looking up to.
6. Cornell - Roses are red violets are blue, mistakenly labeled champs last year, but maybe that headline this year will be worth a redo?
7. St Lawrence - Roses are red, violets are blue, Will there be enough momentum from last year to carry through?
8. UMD - Roses are red, violets are blue, freshmen in numbers will be their renew.
9. Northeastern - Roses are red, violets are blue, second fiddle to BC seems like deja vu
10. Quinnipiac - Roses are red, violets are blue, Bobcats have talent so what's new?

"For absolutely no reason we went to Canada and when we were coming back over the border they asked us if we had anything to declare...
I said yes...War." Steven Wright

The joke will be on them when the 2018 Pre-Champs Manual is released and the NCAA actually addresses the problem because I brought it up.

Short answer: Yes, I expect at least one Alliance team to be in the top 8 of the PWR. Because they are almost exclusively playing each other, the RPI would be able to detect much of a difference between the alliance teams and the rest of the regular D1 programs, relative to strength of schedule (it can't tell that these teams are "bad" relative to the others if they only play them a couple times). 5-6 losses will easily get a team from the scheduling alliance in.

St. A's is the team you have to worry about. They were 7-0 or something against the other alliance teams and the games weren't particularly close. But from what I understand, there will be a bit of a tweak to the criteria to address this (you're welcome).